Ruth Pastine’s newest paintings are visually stunning and instantly engaging as viewer’s try to confirm their undulating properties and seeming vibration. Color is the key as she exploits the contrast between certain hues, blurring their transitions and boundaries to create a visual pulse and rhythm.

Matter of Light, an exhibition that debuts a new body of dynamic paintings by Ruth Pastine and her first solo exhibition with David Richard Gallery will be presented from November 11 through December 31, 2016 at the gallery located at 1570 Pacheco Street, Santa Fe, NM 87505, phone: 505-983-9555. An opening reception with the artist will be held Friday, November 11 from 5:00 - 7:00 PM.

Pastine’s unique approach to exploring visual perception — by methodically constructing a series of oppositions within a single painting and across an entire body of work — is subtle and creates multiple real and perceived tensions in her newest compositions. Avoiding defined boundaries and structures, Pastine’s paintings are ethereal and quickly take the viewer into uncharted territory that is transcendent and drifts into the metaphysical realm. Those oppositions create optical effects, achieved by juxtaposing, layering and transitioning, as the artist says, “high-key” saturated colors and steep value gradients that produce soft blended borders that give the illusion of the hues moving forward and backward, in and out of the picture plane. Having studied at Hunter College in New York, Pastine is well rooted in color theory and fully understands the interaction of adjacent colors that yields great illusory effects, giving her paintings a lot of push/pull and maximal vibration. Painstakingly created by hand using only brushes and oil paint, her paintings are created from thousands of strokes that layer, blend and transition colors subtly from one to the other.

Born in New York City, Ruth Pastine attended The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art, New York, NY receiving her BFA in 1987. Upon graduating she was awarded a travel and research grant to attend The Gerrit Rietveld Academie in Amsterdam, Netherlands. She returned to New York City to receive her MFA from Hunter College of the City University of New York City in 1993. Pastine is the recipient of the Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts Grants in 1999 and 2000 with a matching Shifting Foundation Grant. In 2001, Pastine relocated from New York City to Southern California where she currently lives and works. She has exhibited widely in the United States and Japan, and is included in many public and corporate collections, including: Achenbach Foundation for Graphic Arts, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, CA; AXA Art, Cologne, Germany; Brookfield Properties, Ernst & Young Plaza, Los Angeles, CA; Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego (MCASD), San Diego, CA; Museum of Art and History (MOAH), Lancaster, CA; Qualcomm, San Diego, CA; and the Frederick R. Weisman Art Foundation, Los Angeles, CA.

Inaugurating MoCNA’s new Kieve Family Gallery is the exhibition Visions and Visionaries. Drawing from the strength and diversity of the permanent collection of the IAIA Museum of Contemporary Native Arts, the artworks on view here enable us to see the world through different eyes and highlight the role of visionaries in IAIA’s history who forged new paths that we continue to follow. Collections tell particular stories—in this case the development of Native art in the American Southwest in the 1960s and its evolution into a national movement today. The collection is testament to the continual risk-taking and innovation that has shaped IAIA, and in turn, MoCNA. The exhibition is divided into different “chapters:” Abstraction; Ways of Seeing; Politics and Perception; and Realism and the Documentary Image. These sections serve to frame the works, create new connections and revise established artistic tropes and movements.

The Governor's Awards for Excellence in the Arts were established in 1974 by Governor Bruce King and First Lady Alice King to celebrate the significant roles – both economic and cultural – that artists, craftspeople and arts supporters play in the life of New Mexico. During its 43-year existence, a diverse and prestigious list of painters, weavers, sculptors, dancers, musicians, storytellers, poets, actors, playwrights and potters have been honored.